Our family's journey with autism and Soma RPM (Rapid Prompting Method) and learning all about our son, Ryan, after unlocking his voice through a letter board after 8 years of silence.

Back to School, Standing for the National Anthem, and a Story

So we have officially been in school for 8 days now and I can honestly say that the past 8 days have been our best homeschooling days yet. Even though I did not have a student-free week to set up a classroom like most teachers do, I have been trying to make planning a priority. I am finding time whenever I can to work on lessons and plan out our schedule for the homeschooling day. I usually do this when Ryan is in the pool, so I am going to have to figure out an alternative teacher planning time when the weather changes!

The first day of school in pictures!

This year, I am keeping a notebook of a daily schedule for our day. It is essentially a running list of what I would like for us to accomplish that day and we check it off as it gets done. Ryan gets some say on the order of things. If we don’t get to something that day, we can carry it to the next day. I contemplated a dry erase board, but this way, I can look back at the notebook and see what we did (and not feel as though we didn’t get anything done that day or week!) I will also be keeping track of all of the books that we read during the year (we have already finished three of them!)

Here is some chicken scratch of our daily schedules. The words at the bottom of the pages are our 10 dictation words for the day (Ryan spells them twice with me holding the board and once with him holding the board and once with it flat on the table). This is to work on independence. After consulting with Soma Mukhopadhyay for my follow up session to receive my Introductory Course Certification for RPM, she told me to work on words that are of the same family group via spelling. This helps with the muscle memory of holding the board on his own.

Dictation words with “ant” in them. Ryan asked for a lesson on Senate Committees so I jotted it down in the notebook so that I wouldn’t forget.

Word groups “est” and “all” with notes on the pages.

In addition, Ryan and I are working on some goals for the year. We went over SMART (specific, measurable, attainable, realistic, and timely) goals and how to write them and the two of us came up with a few to start with (we will be adding some more as I think that we need more academically focused ones but I am not big on tests at this point and we only came up with these the past few days). I thought that I would share them with you too.

Goals
1. Ryan and Mom will read 7 novels by December 2016.
2. Ryan and Mom will read 4 nonfiction books by December 2016.
3. Ryan will interview one person weekly for 30 minutes through December 2016. He will select the person and prepare interview questions and actively ask questions during the interview.
4. Ryan will participate in one field trip weekly by helping to pick the venue and following up with appropriate assignment after the trip (thank you card, blog post, report) through December 2016.
5. Ryan will sit at the desk for work (RPM lessons and other work) for 2 hours on classroom days, broken up into 4/30 minute blocks through December 2016.
6. Ryan and another family member or caregiver (other than Mom) will read 3 books together (novels or nonfiction) by December 2016.
7. Ryan will sit to watch television (a documentary, movie, or the news) for 30 minutes at a time without getting up to wander around by December 2016.
8. Ryan will climb to the top of a rock wall at Summit Gym by December 2016.

We will certainly be adding to this list as the year goes on and I am okay with modifying these as necessary.

*****

Today, we did a lesson on the National Anthem and we talked about Colin Kaepernick. I presented the story to Ryan (trying to not show an opinion either way) and this is what he had to say about it. He asked me to share it on his blog:

PREACHING TO SAY WHAT HE IS DOING IS WRONG. HE DEARLY IS MAKING PUBLICITY OFF OF THE WRONG THING.

WE ALL NEED TO SUPPORT TIRELESS EFFORTS FOR BETTER POLICE TRAINING SO THAT THESE INCIDENTS FIND THEMSELVES NO MORE.

*****

Ryan also asked me to share this recent story that he wrote with Adriana:

A LONG TIME AGO A BOY NAMED GARY HAD A MONKEY CALLED CARL. CARL GOT INTO TROUBLE AND CARL BEHAVED BADLY. BEING HARD TO CONTROL, CARL HAD TO BE GIVEN AWAY. CARL TRIED TO GET GARY TO LET HIM STAY. HE CRIED BECAUSE GARY COULD NOT ADOPT HIM. CARL DID HAVE A CHANCE AT A NORMAL LIFE BUT HE BEHAVED BADLY AND LET CARELESS CHOICES GET IN THE WAY. HE HAD CHOSEN TO HAVE HIS CARELESS CHOICES CONTROL HIS DESTINY.

THE MORAL IS TO TRY AND HAVE SELF CONTROL TO BE GOOD AND HAVING SELF CONTROL LETS YOU HAVE A BETTER LIFE.

Adriana then asked Ryan if it applied to his own life.

DEAR ADRIANA, CONTROL IS IMPORTANT BECAUSE HAVING IT HAS IMPACT ON HAVING A HAPPY LIFE.

Enjoying the Rangers game yesterday in 94 degree weather and being in great control of himself.

On a side note, I asked Ryan about the use of the name Carl. If you remember, he used it for a boy before for a time travel story that he wrote with me. His response:

I very much enjoy your blog Ryan. I particularly enjoyed your summer adventures and your get together with your friends. I love this post because my kids are starting school the day after Labor Day and there will be lots of challenges. I like your SMART goals, having goals is a great idea. I wish you a successful school year. 💕